Liberia is a country blessed with natural resources. Its natural
endowments include diamonds, gold and iron ore,
extensive stands of tropical timber, abundant water and
cropland, and a climate and soil conditions conducive to
the cultivation of cash crops such as rubber, cocoa and
coffee. Thanks to very recent discoveries, Liberia can even
boast oil and gas reserves, of undetermined but potentially
sizeable proportions.
And yet despite this vast storehouse of natural wealth – or
because of it – Liberia remains one of the poorest and
least developed places on earth, with per capita GDP
income of US$152 (2004), 40% of the adult population
illiterate, and life expectancy at birth of under 40 years.
Liberia, arguably more than anywhere in the world, is a
darkly resplendent example of the resource curse, the
phenomenon by which countries blessed with natural
resources grow more slowly, stay poorer and offer less to
their people than their comparatively resource poor neighbours.